While technology has rendered rotary phones, VCRs, encyclopedia sets and dozens of other objects of daily life obsolete, Pennsylvania’s election laws have been mired in the past. While there is no harm in continuing to use, say, a top-loading VCR from 1982, the Commonwealth’s antiquated election laws have effectively limited ballot access and reinforced the power of political bosses.
Fortunately, earlier this week the General Assembly passed landmark legislation reforming Pennsylvania’s elections. Signed into law by Gov. Tom Wolf as Act 77 of 2019, this legislation will increase ballot access and election security and limit the reach of party leaders and operatives.
Act 77 makes it much easier for Pennsylvanians to cast an absentee ballot. Current law only permits voters to cast an absentee ballot if they are ill or will be absent from their home municipality on Election Day. This legislation eliminates that requirement, allowing for de facto voting by mail. Also called ‘no-excuse’ absentee voting exists in 28 other states.
The soon-to-be law also moves the deadline for the submission of absentee ballots from the Friday before an election to 8pm on Election Day, coinciding with the closure of the state’s polling precincts. This change makes Pennsylvania the forty-eighth state to align its absentee ballot deadline with the end of in-person voting.
Pennsylvanians will also be able to register to vote up to 15 days prior to an election rather than the current 30 days, making the Commonwealth one of thirty-three states to allow residents to register in the four weeks prior to an election.
Act 77 eliminates the option of casting a ‘straight party’ vote, where by making just one mark on a ballot an elector casts his or her vote for all candidates running on that party’s ticket. Currently, Pennsylvania is just one of five states that offer a straight party option, a vestige of an era where voters were completely subject to the self-serving whims of party leaders.
The argument of those opposed to the elimination of straight party voting are not just baseless, but patronizing. They apparently prefer the supposed convenience of straight party voting to the informed participation of citizens, a point-of-view which denigrates and devalues the right of every citizen to vote.
Additionally, Act 77 provides $90 million to counties towards the purchase of new, more secure voting machines with auditable paper ballots, provides $4 million for census outreach efforts and addresses other technical matters.
Act 77 isn’t perfect – good bills rarely are. We have more work to do, namely permitting Pennsylvania’s almost 800,000 independents to participate in primary elections. But it is a step in the right direction. It will expand ballot access, make our elections more secure, limit the influence of party bosses and promote a better informed electorate.
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